Election judges approved, government study questioned

EDWARDSVILLE — A resolution approving election judges was OK’d while a proposed study on the county was questioned by the Government Relations Committee at its meeting Monday.

The election judge list contains roughly 1,100 names. Each of the 225 polling precincts approximately has five judges.

Early voting will start in late September at the County Clerk’s Office, then expand to off-site locations in October before the Nov. 6 election. The resolution must be approved by the full County Board.

At the meeting, there was also discussion about a proposal from Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville to conduct a study of the county’s governmental structure.

Committee members delayed action on the study proposal due to a number of questions.

One question brought up was whether some of what the proposal entails should be done by county employees, specifically Compliance Officer John Thompson.

“We have people who are paid to do that, let them do it,” Chairman Don Moore, R-Troy, said.

The study proposal is outlined in a July 9 letter to Finance and Government Operations Committee Chair Lisa Ciampoli, R-Collinsville, from representatives of SIUE’s Department of Public Administration and Analysis, School of Business and Department of Political Science.

The initial summery study would be at no cost to the county, but additional work might be contracted.

According to the letter, the study would deal with a “surface level analysis of the existing governance and operational structure;” and reviews of bylaws, procedures and administrative code.

The study would be approximately 25 pages in length, and take about a month to complete.

The issue is also on the agenda of the Wednesday, Aug. 8 Finance Committee meeting.